The Death Pictures (17 page)

So to the last picture. Good job he thought, he’d had enough of McCluskey’s riddles. It was clear there were two self-portraits here and there was another clock too. Indicating time was running out on him? It said five to 12. Did that mean 5212? Another possible combination? But again, to what? And what did the planets below the young McCluskey and above the older version mean? Symbolism of the passage of time, one day the world at his feet, the next it’s beaten him? And what did that river of numbers at the bottom of the picture indicate? He couldn’t see any patterns in there at all.

Dan pushed the pictures away. He sat back on his chair and drank some more beer. Enough.

Had he made any progress? He had one or two ideas, but… The word no kept coming back to him. It was joined by an annoying vision of McCluskey reclining in a Sedan chair, at a fireside in a warm and comfortable heaven, looking down at him and laughing helplessly.

Enough. Time for some easier puzzles, like what beer to have next and what pie from the excellent home cooked menu. Probably the minty lamb he thought, and with chips too. It was the weekend after all. Maybe even a pudding to follow. He didn’t get one last night after that screaming match with Kerry. His brain needed fuelling after all this thinking, however ineffectual.

Every boat trip brought back a hated memory. Dan had been on a brief school holiday to France when he was ten years old and it still ranked as one of his top five worst experiences. The seas were mountainous and the eight hours on the water had all been spent vomiting. The deck was freezing cold and soaked in rain and sticky sea spray, but he’d had no option other than to stand there and wait for the next bout of retching. It’d taken days to recover and was still a living memory, more than a generation on. But he enjoyed the water taxi ride back from Turnchapel to the Barbican. It helped sober him up.

It was coming up to eight o’clock and the sky had dimmed to an inky velvet. Green and red jewels of navigation lights shone and shimmered in the oily water. The boat chugged in its acrid fog of diesel fumes. Two swashes of waves from its prow cast a cone of white in its wake. Dan registered the handful of other passengers pulling coats up around their necks, but he didn’t feel cold. Beer was a wonderful insulator.

Two tower blocks of flats shone with chessboard patterns of window lights at the Barbican’s southern edge. He stood up from the boat’s hard wooden bench and gazed out across Plymouth Sound. The silhouette of Drake’s Island rose like a dark fist breaking from the steely water. A sleek warship slipped menacingly alongside, as if guarding the harbour. The rocky cliffs of the Hoe towered behind it, topped by the blunted obelisk of Smeaton’s Tower lighthouse.

A change in the easy wind ushered away the engine’s diesel cloud and the air around them was filled with the tang of salt. They were near the Barbican now, and Dan could hear the scrapes of uncertain stiletto heels on the cobbles and shrieks of laughter. Above, the wheeling gulls joined in with their mocking cries. He breathed in deeply, then again, leant over the side of the boat and trailed a hand in the caressing water. Its sudden chill made him shiver.

El was waiting in The Seafarer’s Arms. He’d sat himself on one of the benches opposite the bar and cuddled a fresh pint of beer along with what looked like a double whisky. He must have realised Dan had been out for a while and was making a noble effort to catch up.

‘Evening, mate,’ said Dan, pushing his way through the crowd. He was pleased at how steady his voice sounded. ‘You got a thirst on?’ He pointed at the two drinks, ‘or are you celebrating something I should know about?’

El produced his usual sleazy grin. ‘It’s kind Mr McCluskey. He’s been very good to poor El. First there was that little unauthorised snap I got of the last Death Picture. That was lucrative.’ The grin widened. ‘Then he did me the favour of dying in a dodgy way! The national papers loved it. The pictures at his place made me some very good money.’

‘And what about the women you’ve got this commission for?’ shouted Dan over his shoulder, as he made it to the haven of the bar. ‘You want another drink?’

‘Whisky and beer,’ came back the reply. In the same glass, wondered Dan? El would be wasted by nine at this rate. He quietly bought himself a shandy.

Billy the landlord was on his usual stool at the far end of the bar. Dan caught his eye and he nodded. The Seafarer’s was famous as a spit and sawdust place, but trouble was rare. Billy was a landlord with countless years’ experience. He could sense a fight coming and it was dealt with quickly. Dan had seen it. It wasn’t pretty. The Seafarer’s was a pub where most of Plymouth’s Commando officers drank and an unwise place to start trouble.

There was a good crowd in tonight. Already the bar was packed. Beer was being spilled onto the ever-sticky stone floor, and voices rose as they competed for attention. All sorts drank in the Seafarer’s. By the bar stood a line of muscled men with short hair and tattoos peeking out from beneath tight T-shirts. Every time the door opened their eyes snapped to it. Military, probably, Dan thought.

In the corner a knot of men leaned together in a huddle around their pints. The table was almost full of empty glasses. Some wore waterproofs, others thick woollen jumpers. All looked ruddy and weatherbeaten, their hair untended in spraying styles. Fishermen, celebrating a good week’s catch most likely. A couple tucked into plastic trays of chips.

There were a few younger lads in loud shirts, their weekend best, jeans fashionably faded, hair spiked and gelled. They were edging imperceptibly towards a group of young girls, all dressed in a uniform of figure-hugging tops and short skirts. The girls had formed a protective circle, just like in the old Westerns, Dan thought with a grin. Draw the wagons up in a ring to try to keep the enemy at bay.

Dan pushed his way back to El, who was aiming a vacant grin all around.

‘What’s the plan for tonight then, El?’ he shouted.

‘Drinking,’ said El simply. Dan gave him a look that said he wanted more detail. ‘Heavy drinking,’ he added helpfully.

‘I got that bit from the state of you already. What I meant was are there any plans to go anywhere else?’

‘Oh yes,’ said El. ‘I’ve got a naughty little idea you might just like.’

Dan woke on Sunday morning feeling slightly thick-headed, but remarkably well considering the two nights running on the beer. Those couple of shandies and the water had kept an angrier hangover at bay. And he’d only had a couple of bottles of lager in the lap-dancing club. He didn’t know whether to feel ashamed or amused. How had El got him in there? He’d become caught up in the moment and the beer had yet again oiled his path to another fate he shouldn’t have known.

So what, he thought? They’d agreed to work together on the Death Pictures riddle and El was the kind of man to have on your side. He knew how to get things done. Dan had no idea how he planned to find the two mystery women from the pictures, but El clearly did. He’d been cryptic as ever, and what did he want with a fancy dress shop?

Yes, it’d been a fun night and he had all day to recover. A Dartmoor walk would be good, he’d been neglecting Rutherford lately. A walk, combined with some research. He fumbled the lead out of the darkness of the hallway cupboard and Rutherford whirled circles around him, jumping up and yapping in that puppy-like way of his. He’d never grown up, that dog. Perhaps it was something to do with his master’s influence?

They passed Merrivale Quarry, a deep granite scar in the rising emerald moorland. Death Picture two lay next to him on the passenger seat. They rounded a corner and there it was ahead, Vixen Tor, the tall, multi-layered, grey granite stack. Dan checked the picture again. It was unmistakeable. His guess had been right. He indicated and pulled in to a small car park hollowed from the hillside. They crossed the road and headed down onto the open moor.

Dartmoor was awakening from its winter hibernation. Above him a brown speckled skylark fluttered and trilled, an eager invitation to a mate. We’re not so different, us humans and the rest of the animal kingdom, Dan thought, revisiting last night, the lap dancer and his pompous chat-up lines about being on television. ‘I wish you better luck than me,’ he called to the bird.

Gorse sprayed the grass with flashes of yellow, the hillsides were freckled with contented white sheep. A thin worn track wound through the thorns of the jabbing bushes. He followed it, his boots slipping on the occasional emerging plate of glassy granite. Above, the sky stretched a dull white, a benevolent covering of cloud. Ideal walking weather. Dan took deep lungfuls of the pure upland air and felt it fill and relax him. It reinflated him with life. The residual headache waned.

A leat gushed ahead of them, gorged by April’s showers. He found a narrowing to jump, steadied himself and leapt, one foot slipping into the freezing water. Rutherford watched, then plunged into the icy, frothing torrent, wading upstream against the current, then turning and letting it carry him back down the hill. He found a stick stuck firm into the muddy bank and head shaking, growling, wrestled it free. He clambered out of the stream and ran for Dan who jumped instinctively back, tried to reach a safe distance, but the dog was too quick. A rain of droplets sprayed from his coat as he shook himself into a spin.

‘No tea for you tonight hound, and you can sleep in the garden too,’ he shouted, laughing and wiping the water from his face.

Dan took the picture from his pocket and unfolded it. ‘Over that hill,’ he called to Rutherford, pointing ahead. He found himself panting as the gradient wound against them. Could the answer to McCluskey’s riddle really be here, he wondered? Surely it wouldn’t be as simple as where the dog was digging? And what was the meaning of the vicar and the plane? And the banner with ‘goodbye number one’ written on it? Real clues? Or more iron pyrites, as the infuriating artist had put it?

Dan scanned around him. It was classic Dartmoor. Tumbled granite boulders, pyramid tors, grassy hills, winding streams, defiant gorse, squelching mud and pervasive bracken, an abstract canvas of green, silver, yellow, grey and brown. The road ran behind them, the tiny dark blocks of a couple of farmhouses on the horizon. There was nothing to suggest any link to the second Death Picture.

‘He’s taking the mickey out of us dog,’ Dan panted to Rutherford. ‘I bet you any amount of dog biscuits the answer’s not here.’ But we’ll keep looking, won’t we? he thought. Because McCluskey’s got me hooked up in his riddle in exactly the way I said I never would be.

They reached the top of the hill and Dan stopped and breathed out heavily in gratitude. He loosened his coat. The sun had forced her way through the clouds, warming the moorland. Rutherford sniffed around a pile of rocks, then sat down on a flat granite slab. Dan was glad to see the dog was panting too. He fumbled the print from his pocket, but before he could study it, a noise from down in the valley stopped him.

He walked on a little, topped the hill, then stopped again. A Dartmoor ranger was surrounded by a group of a dozen people. Ugly brown scores marked the green spread of the moor grass around where they stood. Dan checked the picture. Yes, this was the spot, as near as he could tell. He looked up at the thinning clouds. Why did he have the feeling McCluskey was laughing himself stupid again?

He walked over to the crowd. Some held mud-coated spades in their hands. They were getting a stern lecture on how it was illegal and immoral to damage the fabric of the moor and how they were too late anyway. The Rangers had been patrolling constantly since Death Picture Two was revealed. They’d turned dozens of people away as they came to dig in the same spot as the dog. There was no answer here.

Dan slipped the lead over Rutherford’s head and put the print quickly back into his pocket before anyone noticed. He kept walking, past the group, pulling the dog to heel. It was only when they’d climbed a tor and reached a safe distance that he burst out laughing. Even Rutherford seemed to find it funny. He had that mouth open, tongue hanging out look that Dan always thought of as his smiling face.

The image of the group searching Dartmoor to dig for the answer to McCluskey’s riddle kept him amused for the rest of the day. Even come Monday morning, his most detested time of the week, he was still smiling at the thought. But the smile died quickly when a man was arrested on suspicion of murdering Joseph McCluskey.

Chapter Nine

The story broke at ten past six. Dan felt his body tense with a flush of adrenaline and annoyance. Perfect timing to maximise the stress for his poor heart. Just 15 minutes to find something sensible to say for the programme.

Adam phoned him with the tip off. ‘This didn’t come from me, but I thought I should warn you. I know you’re on air in a mo. It’ll go on the force’s website in the next half hour anyway. There’s a limit to what I can say, but this evening we’ve arrested a man on suspicion of murdering Joseph McCluskey.’

Shit! ‘Who?’

‘I can’t say.’

‘Kid?’

A pause. ‘Might be.’

‘How might?’

Another hesitation. ‘This didn’t come from me.’

‘OK, OK. I got that. It never does.’

‘A lot might.’

A hasty scribbled note. ‘Why?’

‘Some new evidence.’

Dan checked the clock. 6.15. Shit.

‘What evidence?’

Another pause. ‘I’ve got to go.’

‘Adam!’

‘OK, strictly not for broadcast, right?’